Top 10 electronics business deals of 2012

Here are 10 of the most significant technology mergers and acquisitions of 2012.

LONDON -- Despite a rocky global economy in 2012, consumer spending on tablet computers and smart phones remained strong as the era of the personal computer fades. These realities helped shape the electronics landscape this year, creating winners and losers in the semiconductor industry and a considerable number of significant mergers and acquisitions.

One of the most intriguing deals, the sale of processor IP licensor MIPS Technologies Inc. (Sunnyvale, Calif.) is still playing out. In November, graphics IP specialist Imagination Technologies it had agreed to buy MIPS' operating business for $60 million while another U.K. company, ARM, would lead a consortium called Bridge Crossing. that would acquire rights to the MIPS portfolio of patents. Bridge Crossing would pay $350 million in cash to purchase the rights to the MIPS portfolio, of which ARM will contribute $167.5 million (see ARM and Imagination divide up MIPS)

Two weeks later, however, Ceva Inc. (Mountain View, Calif.) sought to trump Imagination's offer for MIPS by bidding $75 million. MIPS shareholders are undoubtedly hoping Imagination or another bidder will respond with an even better offer.

There were other deals this year in the mixed-signal and RF market segments, including GPS and wireless chip company U-blox acquiring chip startup Cognovo for $16.5 million along with 4M Wireless for $9 million, both for their expertise in 3GPP LTE technology (see U-box buys Cognovo and 4M Wireless).

Here's the list:

The semiconductor mergers and acquisitions described below and on the following pages represent some of the key technology deals of 2012. They also illustrate the constant churn and reshaping of the global electronics industry. (Please note they're not ranked or ordered; all are considered significant.)

Deal: Apple Bites Anobit

Early in 2012, Apple announced its acquisition of flash memory controller startup Anobit Technologies (Herzeliya, Israel) for about $390 million. Anobit represented a catch for Apple because the Israeli company developed NAND flash memory controller technology that improves the apparent endurance of flash memory – the number of reads and writes it can perform.

The Anobit deal underscores an industry trend as all-powerful Apple pulls in key aspects of its supply chain. Left unanswered for now is whether Apple will in the coming year move to internal chip manufacturing. (see Apple buys Anobit).

This is why Apple is king in quality products. Apple just makes everything better than the rest. This gotta get you even more upset huh? Upset for no reason at all. I can't afford a Ferrari but I don't just hate the company for it. I just don't get these Apple hater trailer trash folks. Oh wait! there is a free Android phone for you at T-Mobile.
Valentine from http://britainloans.co.uk/

Not sure what you mean by Google acquiring Moto Mobility is an equipment deal and therefore somehow not relevant? Some would argue its the insurance policy for Android. You are right, the other two were 2011 deals, oops (blush), time sure seems to fly.

@tpfj
Intel acqisition of Infineon closed in January 2011
Nvidia acquisition of Icera closed in June 2011
Google Moto deal did close in 2012 but was first announced in August 2011 and is equipment related.
Samsung acquisition of CSR mobile development operations is an important deal that was first announced in July 2012. Samsung agreed to pay CSR plc (Cambridge, England) $310 million for its handset connectivity and location operations and the associated technology. Samsung has also agreed to invest an additional $34.4 million to take a 4.9 percent stake in publicly-held CSR.
We covered the story initially here:
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4390445/Samsung-acquires-CSR-s-mobile-business
and followed up with an analysis here:
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4391689/Does-Samsung-deal-leave-CSR-out-in-the-cold-
Thanks to tpfj for the reminder.